While a title such as Shout Hallelujah may have conjured images of a gospel meeting disguised as comedy, Halley Metcalfe has devised a show that discussed the merits of Optimism verses Pessimism and sought to find a personal solution for herself. In the discussion, she covered many of the interrelated topics such as parental influence, childhood happiness, friendships and self help.
Early on, Halley made it clear that she had a significant leaning toward the pessimist camp so most would have expected a venom filled tirade of sorts. Instead she presented the material in a cheerful and upbeat manner which kept with her usual stage persona. She gave small amusing glimpses of a twisted soul that lie beneath, the perfect way to set up the overall indecision motif of the show.
Humour wise, Halley started off slowly by providing some rather dry background but was able to build momentum as she progressed. For the most part, it was smile inducing humour with the odd big laugh item thrown in to keep you on your toes. In keeping with the theme of pessimism, Haley included quite a few pieces of darker material that initially seemed to come out of nowhere. The contrast and surprise provided many of the chuckles as well as bit of nervous laughter.
There was a little bit of audience polling at times but, given her personality, there was nothing threatening to the resulting audience banter. The timid audience that I was a part of were quiet to begin with, Halley assuming us to be in disagreement with a pessimistic view point and began a running gag of referring to us as a bunch of optimists. Other responses to her polling resulted in short exchanges that rarely drifted too far from the point at hand.
A clever closing sequence to the show, that could have gone in a number of directions, gave the show an apt, but perhaps irrelevant, sense of closure. As is the case with many comedians, this was more a case of personal therapy for Halley than a performance with a singular conclusion. With her gentle, warm and friendly stage manner she kept us entertained, whether or not she solved her issues. She didn’t browbeat you with one viewpoint or the other, instead telling some delightful personal stories.
It was a fairly bare boned presentation especially considering that she had enough on her plate doing her own tech work. It was basically Halley on stage with a microphone, using only a small portion of PowerPoint. For items such as the analysis of children’s drawings these slides were important, however there were times where they added little to illustrate the point, merely repeating what she had just mentioned.
Shout Hallelujah was a fun show. It was rather gentle in its tone and didn’t smash you over the head. The subtitle ‘C’Mon Get Happy’ was certainly fulfilled.
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